Media Analysis Of Adolescence

Media Analysis of Adolescence In this piece “ Why Teenagers Act Crazy”, which was published in the New York Times, author Richard A. Friedman takes a deeper look into the understanding of why adolescents act the way they do during this time period of their lives. Commonly in this stage of development adolescents are filled with risk taking, emotional drama, and other forms of peculiar behaviors has always been associated with the number of social and emotional challenges that take place during this time period such as separation from parents, acceptance from peer groups, and trying to figure out who they are. But there is an underlying variable that has not been fully understood and that is the surge of anxiety and fearfulness that has also

In turn the reward center drives the risky behavior displayed by teens. This helps explain why the top three killers of teenagers are accidents, homicide, and suicide. This lag in brain development has enormous implications on how people view anxiety and how it should be treated. Up to twenty percent of adolescents experience a diagnosable anxiety disorder and can be from a mix of genetic factors and environmental influences. In a study ran by Weill Cornell Medical College and Stanford University found that when adolescents were shown fearful faces, they had amplified responses in the amygdala compared with children and adults. So in other words the fear circuit is a two way street, while we have limited control over the fear alarm in the amygdala, our prefrontal cortex is able to give the ability to asses the risk, but with the later development of the prefrontal cortex we have a lot less control. Parents have to realize that adolescent anxiety is to be expected and to help comfort their teenagers and remember that their brains will develop and will eventually grow out of having

J. Casey, a professor of psychology and the director of the Sackler Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College, showed, “a colored square at the same time that they were exposed to an aversive noise. The colored square, previously a neutral stimulus, became associated with an unpleasant sound and elicited a fear response similar to that elicited by the sound” (Friedman). Then he went through a process of trying to get them to unlearn the association between the colored square and the noise, a process referred to as fear extinction. Dr. Casey discovered that adolescents had a harder time unlearning the association than a adult or child. This impairment may lead to being less responsive to treatment such as cognitive behavior therapy. The author goes on to say that in a recent study to help with anxiety that 81 percent responded to the combination of cognitive behavioral therapy or antidepressants, but other studies show that there is a less response. Finally, Friedman states that this isn’t to say that cognitive therapy is ineffective for teenagers, but that because of their relative difficulty in learning to be unafraid, it may not be the most effective treatment when used on its